Snow-Packed

Just as you start to figure it out, Iowa pulls a fast one on you. After having multiple days of sunny skies and 50 degree fall weather, the Iowa morning awoke in a Winter mode. As the evening ran darker throughout the day before, a cold wind that had been circulating, but not striking, finally gained enough momentum to bring in the snow flurries. Now shovels are being dragged across sidewalks, and brake lights are more common then the stop-lights that now radiate in a cup of snow.  The weather forecast had predicted it, but based on their past misplaced judgments, it was a snowy surprise.

It's a contrasting feeling between the short but welcomed false summer of the last couple of weeks and the new ice-fort I have awoken to. Let me assure you, the thermometer at my place is never above 62 degrees and every temperature drop is noticed. I had been slightly sun-burnt from Iowa January a few days ago and now I feel the need to adorn the winter gear a la Randy from the "Christmas Story." -->

Iowans almost have a sick pride in our radical weather jumps. Like the stereotypical image of the Iowa farmers talking about rain on the front porch, some natives, myself included, get a sense of excitement over drastic weather changes.

And it's not just Iowa Natives, its most Mid-Westerners. We all not only take the weather in strides, we relish in the changing forecasts and the gambling weathermen and women. It may be looking to deeply into a situation that could be labeled "just how it is," but perhaps the variable Bingo game that Mid-Westerners play each year with the weather is attributable to the Mid-West personality. The same personality that is so keenly portrayed as rural and corn-fed in a caricature sense.

While it may be true that we are corn-fed, much of the denser parts of Iowa is not farmland, and the personality that I am referring to is beyond occupation. Mid-Westerners (in general) are always nice enough for conversation, sharp enough for dialogue, and are always able to roll alongside any situation. And it may be the snow packed to closely to my window, but I believe that those personality traits are linked to the weather.

Mid-Westerners can and have dealt with a lot of wild weather conditions. And rarely we have any say in it. Alongside 50 degree weather in January we have seen rain that freezes upon impact, blazing summer heat that burns the bottom of rubber running shoes, tornadoes that rip the red paint off of barn-doors, biblical sized floods, and of course more snow then what we know to do with. And when the dust finally settles, we all marvel at the impeccable force nature has dealt to us.

We know that value of hard-work as we shovel our cars out of five feet of fresh snow, we understand the alertness that comes with an approaching thunderstorm, and most importantly we deal with it. And we deal with it a touch of eloquence I might add. We ski through snow-covered streets and battle the heat with cold-drinks and fresh food, and our complaints are always cast aside against revelry and appreciation. Appreciation for the fact that we can not only handle the weather that defines our region, but we embrace the obstacles to the point that it begins to define our very lives.

-BL